Navy warships using guns to a maximum range of 15 miles have traditionally provided naval fire support for the Marine Corps and Army. The introduction of Tomahawk missiles increased the range of the fire support, but the size and expense of the missiles precludes meeting the volume of fire needed by the Marine Corps and Army. Navy warships are built to meet multipurpose warfighting requirements and therefore cannot carry sufficient gun ammunition or Tomahawk missiles to support a 30-day naval fire support mission for the Marine Corps or Army.
One approach to handling different missiles utilizes multipurpose launchers, of modular construction, which can be reconfigured, as necessary. The modular launchers can launch missiles, rockets, chaff and decoys. U.S. Pat. No. 5,452,640, granted Sep. 26, 1995, to Stan P. Bovee et al, discloses such a modular system—see FIGS. 7-9 and note column 2, line 36-column 3, line 29. FIGS. 10-11 show, in schematic fashion, the electronic circuitry for selectively firing the launchers.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,942,713, granted Aug. 24, 1999, to Leszek S. Basak, addresses the conflicting demands of increased firepower, and limited space, upon naval ships, in a different manner. Basak discloses a multiple missile launcher (12) having a plurality of canister holding chambers or cells (14s, 14b, 14c, 14d, 143, 14f, 14g, 14h). Each canister includes a standard connector (16c) for connection by a standard cable (17) to a mission launch sequencer (410; see FIG. 4). Each canister is loaded with four missiles (316; see FIG. 3). The cable has more than enough signal paths to couple launch and safe signals to a single missile, but not sufficient signal paths to independently control four missiles. Selection signals are sent over a selected one of the four separate signal paths to directly arcuate a relay (405, 406, 407 and 408) associated with the selected one of the missiles.
Although the Basak patent provides increased missile packed density, the need for even further space saving measures, upon naval ships, remains unsatisfied. Also, the need for safely transporting and handling large quantities, of densely packed rocket assisted payloads (RAP), of diverse configurations, remains unaddressed. Similarly, the need to determine the appropriate ship platform (naval warships or commercial container ships) to deploy and launch the rocket assisted payloads (RAP) must be resolved, or a common platform must be created. Applicant has addressed these problems and devised a solution that can be effectively implemented, by all branches of the military.